Solely aggregation of news articles, with no opinions expressed by this service since 2009 launch on this platform.
Copyright to all articles remains with the publisher and HEADLINES ARE CLICKABLE to access published articles.
(Subscription by RSS is recommended, even though email, LinkedIn and Google+ updates are available.)

"The night shift at Agropolychim, Bulgaria’s biggest fertiliser plant, received a fax at 4.30am on January 6 2009 warning that their gas supply was going to be cut off immediately. The engineers demanded four more hours: an instant shutdown would leave a cocktail of explosive chemicals to congeal in the plant’s pipes, destroying vital equipment. “It was all hands on deck,” recalls Philippe Rombaut, Agropolychim’s chief executive.

Bulgaria was one of the countries hardest hit when Russia cut the gas supply to Europe during that biting winter. Electric heaters sold out within hours. People in many parts of the Balkans had to go back to burning wood. In Sofia, the zoo’s shivering African monkeys were kept alive with buckets of herbal tea mixed with lemon and honey.

Today, Bulgaria is once again seen as extremely vulnerable if political tensions over Ukraine trigger an energy crunch this winter."

"The pull-back in Middle Eastern stock markets may slow on Wednesday after global markets started stabilising, but concern about economic growth in Europe and China lingers while oil prices continue to slide.

Most bourses in the Middle East declined on Tuesday in line with global equities, although the sell-off was less aggressive than in the previous round on Sunday.

Overnight, Wall Street put in a mixed performance. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq gained modestly to break a three-day string of sharp declines, but the Dow fell for a fourth day."

"One of Saudi Arabia’s most prominent businessmen, Prince Al Waleed bin Talal, has publicly criticised his country’s oil policy, which in recent weeks has signalled an acceptance of lower oil prices in an effort to shake out higher-cost producers.

In an open letter addressed to the Saudi oil minister, Ali Al Naimi, Prince Al Waleed pointed to widely publicised remarks Mr Al Naimi made in Kuwait last month in which the minister said lower oil prices were “no cause for alarm”.

The prince wrote: “We would like to express our surprise and bafflement and repudiation of these statements and others like it that seek to downplay the negative impact lower oil prices would have on the kingdom’s budget.”"

"Russia’s return to the debt markets ended after three bond sales amid investor bets that interest rates will need to rise as the ruble and oil prices sink.

The government scrapped this week’s auction of bonds, known as OFZs, after yields on the nation’s 10-year securities jumped to a five-year high and the ruble extended the world’s steepest drop since June. Wagers the central bank will raise borrowing costs have climbed to the highest level since the 2008 global financial crisis as the currency fell to record lows against the dollar-euro basket on all but one day this month.

“There’s no demand for OFZs whatsoever,” Yulia Safarbakova, an analyst at BCS Financial Group in Moscow, said by e-mail yesterday. “All the risks are still within, and at current levels bonds look unappealing.”"

"The decline in oil prices may be depriving Russian President Vladimir Putin of his biggest ally.

Oil has been the key to Putin’s grip on power since he took over from Boris Yeltsin in 2000, fueling a booming economy that grew 7 percent on average from 2000 to 2008.

Now, with economic growth slipping close to zero, Russia is reeling from sanctions by the U.S. and the European Union over its land grab in Ukraine, and from a ruble at a record low. Putin, whose popularity has been more than 80 percent in polls since the annexation of the Crimean Peninsula in March, may have less money to raise state pensions and wages, while companies hit by the sanctions also seek state aid to maintain spending."

"Brent crude extended its biggest one-day collapse in four years amid speculation OPEC will refrain from eliminating a glut while demand growth slows to its lowest since 2009.

Brent slumped as much as 2 percent to $83.37 a barrel on the ICE Futures Europe exchange in London. Yesterday it plunged 4.3 percent, the biggest one-day drop since September 2011. Global oil demand will rise by 650,000 barrels a day this year, the Paris-based agency said in its monthly report yesterday. That’s a reduction of 250,000 from a prior projection.

“The market is currently in a state of panic as no one is prepared to put a hand under it,” Ole Sloth Hansen, an analyst at Saxo Bank A/S in Copenhagen, said by e-mail."